Mika Zibanejad: Rangers unfazed by losing Kaapo Kakko before Saturday's game

To hear Mika Zibanejad tell it, losing the team’s first-line right wing to an injury just moments before the opening faceoff for Saturday’s game against the Arizona Coyotes wasn’t anything that was going to faze these Rangers. Not the way this season has gone so far.

"With the waiting for all the negative, positive [COVID-19] tests, or all the test results . . . I feel like we’ve played with most of the guys at this point,’’ Zibanejad said at Monday’s morning skate. "So obviously you have to adjust a little bit, but at that point, you just go out and play. And I thought [Dryden Hunt] did a good job. And you just have to be ready for anything, really.’’

Kaapo Kakko took the pregame warmup skate with the Rangers before Saturday’s game, but moments before puck drop the Rangers announced he would be unable to play because of an upper-body injury. Hunt stepped up to play in Kakko’s spot on right wing with Zibanejad and Chris Kreider before coach Gerard Gallant put Artemi Panarin in that spot later in the game.

With Kakko placed on injured reserve Monday and forward Filip Chytil (lower-body injury) also unavailable for Monday’s game at Madison Square Garden against the Los Angeles Kings, Gallant was in the position of having to rearrange his lineup for the game. One possibility, the coach said, was dressing 11 forwards and seven defensemen, rather than the usual 12 and six.

The team played well with 11 forwards Saturday after Chytil left the game with his injury, Gallant said. And so, while he said that wouldn’t be something he’d want to do long term, the coach wasn’t averse to using it for a single game if necessary. Another possibility Gallant admitted he was considering was keeping Panarin, normally a left wing, up at right wing with Zibanejad and Kreider.

"He might start there [Monday] and then we’ll see,’’ Gallant said of Panarin with Zibanejad and Kreider. "Is it going to be long term? Maybe, but probably not. So we’ll see. We’ll mix and match our lines a little bit. It [Kreider-Zibanejad-Panarin] was obviously real good last time, but it’s about our team and not about one line.’’

Putting his top three forwards on the same line against Arizona worked to the point where Kreider got a hat trick, which gave him 29 goals, tying him with Alexander Ovechkin for the NHL lead. The three goals also gave Kreider five goals and two assists in three games last week, which led to him being named the NHL’s First Star of the Week.

In the long term, keeping Panarin with Zibanejad and Kreider would make the Rangers seriously top-heavy, as it puts three of their top four scorers (defenseman Adam Fox led the team with 45 points entering Monday) all on the same line. It would make for a high-powered line, to be certain, but would weaken the second line, which would then have Ryan Strome playing with less accomplished wingers. After Strome, whose 31 points entering Monday was good for fifth on the team, no other forward had more than 17 points.

Gallant, though, said Chytil’s injury was expected to keep him out on a day-to-day basis, meaning that with the Rangers not playing again until Thursday in Columbus, there’s a possibility that he might end up missing only one game. His return would certainly lengthen the lineup and increase the coach’s options.

For however long it was going to last, Zibanejad was happy to play a regular shift with Panarin.

"You never say no to that,’’ he said. "I don’t think me or Kreids had to change anything. We’re three very different players, and just got to take advantage of each other’s strengths.’’

By Colin Stephenson

colin.stephenson@newsday.comColinSNewsday

Colin Stephenson covers the Rangers for Newsday. He has spent more than two decades covering the NHL and just about every sports team in the New York metropolitan area.